He took her back to the river, where he’d last lost the creature’s trail.

  “It’s not a deer,” Eileen muttered as Séamus watched the young woman study the tracks. “The prints are too wide for it to be a deer, and do you notice the torn branches nearby? Someone else might confuse it for deer antlers breaking them, but none of the native deer of Ireland are that big. The biggest red deer I know is a bit more than seven feet long. This thing would be nearly five times taller. It's a beast.”

  That description sounded to Séamus like a nightmare. Five times bigger than a deer? He wasn’t even familiar with deer on this island, locals hardly ever saw them, but if they were anything like horses, that would be trouble. His mind raced: his old Lee-Enfield No. 4, chambered in .303 British, was serviceable for birds and small game, but could it put down a creature of such monstrous proportions quickly enough? He recalled the tragic end of Brian, impaled by the beast’s brutal force, and shuddered at the thought.

  In the bright light of day, Séamus managed to spot all the flecks of blood scattered about. The marks didn’t seem like they were simply spilled; rather, it looked as if the creature had tried to wash off its own blood. He frowned, thinking how this might tie into the creature’s injury during the storm, a detail that could explain why it left Brian’s body unconsumed.

  “You are not at all disgusted by all this blood?” he asked, turning to her. In his mind, he counted the many times he’d seen blood before, sheep births, cow calvings, even a stint in butchery during his younger days had conditioned him to the mess. Yet he recalled with a pang how his late wife would recoil at even a small cut, and he wondered if Gretten’s niece, raised in the polished environs of Dublin, could truly handle such raw, rural carnage.

  “No,” Eileen replied coolly, dipping a finger into a darker smear and tapping it thoughtfully against her other hand. “I’ve studied animals up close during my coursework. Look, I’ve got two different blood sources here.” She then brought her fingers together and, with a slight frown, remarked, “Human and animal blood have different consistencies. I could be wrong, but I doubt it.”

  Séamus frowned. “You can’t have noticed that just by touching it.”

  "No, but human and animal blood clot differently. Human blood has more platelets, it thickens faster. Is this a darker bit here? It's already clotted more than the other. I'd bet that's Brian's."

  Séamus thought the idea was ridiculous, even absurd, and yet he held his tongue. Perhaps she was trying to impress him, or maybe, just maybe, there was a kernel of truth in her wild leap of logic. The blood, the torn branches, the enormous hoofprints, all these pieces began to form an unsettling puzzle.

  Inside, Séamus’s thoughts churned. He knew the Lee-Enfield wasn’t designed for large, unanticipated targets like this; it required precision and nerves of steel. He recalled the tremor in his own hands during past hunts and wondered if he could ever manage a shot that would stop a creature of this size in one clean blow before it could do to someone else what it had done to Brian.

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  “Yeah, that gun could probably kill it if you get a headshot, but are you that good a shot?” Eileen challenged, her tone mixing skepticism with a hint of daring.

  Séamus shifted uncomfortably, the weight of responsibility and the enormity of the creature pressing down on him. “I’ve been hunting birds and small game all my life,” he grumbled, “and a simple bear trap would do the trick if we can lure it in.” He frowned, picturing a rudimentary snare or jaw trap made of heavy iron and simple mechanics, something that, in his mind, required little more than bait and timing.

  Eileen’s eyes narrowed as she set the shovel aside, stepping closer. “A bear trap?” she repeated, more as a question than a statement. “Do you really think that’s enough for a creature this size? It might be that simple, but it also means we’d be relying on sheer luck and perfect timing. The animal might not even be fooled by our bait, and if it misses the trap by a hair’s breadth, we’re as good as done for.”

  Séamus bristled. “Listen, I’m not saying it’ll be perfect, but a bear trap’s proven. It’s straightforward, if the beast steps on the trigger, the jaws clamp down. We wouldn’t have a lot of variables, just a heavy metal trap and some good bait.”

  Eileen folded her arms and crossed her gaze with his. “I respect simplicity, Séamus, but with this creature, more can go wrong with a basic design. We need something that takes into account the creature’s instincts, something that’s selective. Think about it: we need the trap to be visible to human eyes so we can monitor it, but obscure enough that the animal won’t be wary of it. A more complicated setup might allow for that sort of finesse.”

  He ran a hand through his tangled beard, his thoughts racing. On one hand, a complex contraption might be ideal in theory, but if even one piece fails, if the trigger mechanism jams or the bait isn’t convincing, the whole trap could backfire. “Complicated traps mean more moving parts, more chances for failure,” he countered. “What if the trigger goes off too early? Or worse, what if it gives the creature time to escape and alert the others?”

  Eileen’s eyes flashed with determination. “I’m not saying we build something out of nowhere that requires rocket science. I’m suggesting we modify the bear trap concept. We add a counterweight system, a delay mechanism that gives us a window of observation. We rig it with a simple lever, something that only triggers when the pressure is sustained for a few crucial seconds. That way, if the creature’s just passing through, it won’t set it off. But if it lingers… then the trap closes with just the right timing.”

  Séamus 's gaze softened as he considered her words. "So you're saying we create a trap that doesn't immediately snap shut at the slightest movement, a trap that gives us time to see what it's doing, to ensure it's really there?"

  “Exactly,” Eileen replied. “It needs to be elegant in its simplicity. A small modification, maybe a counterweight built from scrap metal from the supply warehouse or even a section of heavy chain that delays the release. We use what’s available. That way, we keep it simple enough not to fail, but sophisticated enough to fool the beast.”

  For a long moment, Séamus looked at her, his internal doubts battling with the practicality of her suggestion. Finally, he exhaled slowly and nodded. "Creating something like that... Even if the design is simple, it's going to take a lot of skill. You much of an engineer?"

  She pouted, reminding him of an outsmarted schoolgirl. “No, but it can't be that hard.”

  “It would take a lot of time, though, we do want to catch the thing before it kills again. A lot of bear traps, even a few custom ones, would work out better.”

  Eileen sighed, “I guess you're right. Time is a factor.”